On July 18, 2017 the Federal Liberal government announced proposed legislative changes that will have a far reaching tax impact on private companies and their shareholders. The draft legislation would mean significant policy changes to the taxation of:

As a member of DFK Canada we have compiled four papers that discuss the proposed changes and the potential impact on the taxation of small businesses and their owners. For a copy of each detailed paper, please click on the above links to access our website.

We encourage your feedback and welcome your input by sending along direct comments to taxchanges@mrsbgroup.com or by phone at 902-368-2643.

As you will have no doubt heard or read through the news media, the federal Department of Finance has released their discussion paper on the use of private corporations for tax planning.

The Department is inviting public comments until October 2, 2017 with a planned implementation of any tax changes in early 2018.

The proposed measures would mean significant changes to four areas:

1. Splitting income with family members.

2. Limiting access to and multiplication of claims by individuals of the lifetime capital gains exemption.

3. Converting a private corporation's regular income into capital gains.

4. Holding passive investments inside a private corporation.

We know that many of you, our valued clients, would be impacted by these proposed changes and while it is early days in the process, we want to assure you that we actively engaged with DFK Canada, our nationwide affiliation of member accounting firms, in developing responses aimed at protecting our small business clients from potentially damaging implications of the proposals as they are now written.

This is the first of what will be several messages to you on this topic. We will keep you informed as our response to the Department of Finance develops and we will be working hard to ensure that both the Minister and his staff clearly understand the financial complexities of operating a successful small business and the benefits of keeping this vital component of our economy financially viable and vibrant.